UPDATED: 14/07/2023
14 July 1950, USA women’s hockey team beat Griqualand West women 2-1.
14 July 1964, SA hockey player Wally Ubsdell dies.
Walter (Wally) Alfred Douglas Ubsdell, a former Springbok hockey player, died in the Kimberley Hospital on Tuesday 14 July 1964 aged 42 years.
Walter (Wally) Alfred Douglas Ubsdell – Former Springbok Hockey Player
Born in Kimberley on 9 February 1922 to Walter Ubsdell (Senior) and Sarah Marie Ubsdell, he was educated at Kimberley Boys’ High School. Wally was employed by De Beers Consolidated Mines and at the time of his death was working at the Bultfontein Mine.
He was the Grandson of diamond pioneer Talbot Ubsdell and great grandson of 1820 settler George Ubsdell. An Uncle, William Talbot Ubsdell, died in East Africa while serving with the South African forces in World War I.
Wally played as goalkeeper for Griqualand West from 1953 to 1957 and in 1953 was selected for the South African hockey team to tour Kenya. Unfortunately the tour was cancelled due to the Mau Mau uprising but his opportunity came again in 1957 when selected as one of two goalkeepers for the Springboks on their tour of Great Britain, Europe and Kenya.
He was a keen sportsman, and apart from hockey, played cricket and soccer for Kenilworth.
Wally was buried in the Gladstone cemetery, one of the last burials in that particular cemetery which had closed in 1900 barring a few pre-purchased family plots.
He left his wife Doreen Elizabeth, daughter Loreen and father Walter Ubsdell (Senior) to mourn his passing.
UPDATED: 14/07/2017
14 July 1964, SA hockey player Wally Ubsdell dies.
DID YOU KNOW
LIFE AT THE DIGGINGS No.4
Trade, Stores and Stocks
Having gone the round of all the Camps and counted all the stores, I proceed to the stocks. There are two kinds of stocks at the Fields. It is, perhaps, of that sort with which I am the least familiar I have now to write. Let me, however, say a word or two about the stocks concerning which I know most. Mr. TRUTER, Free State Magistrate at Pniel, carried on a most thriving trade with about the poorest stocks I have ever seen. The fine old wooden anklets which form one of the most agreeable features of village life in England are easy chairs in comparison with the stocks at the Diggings; but I never saw a foot in the keeping of the former, while, at Pniel, the holes were never empty. I often used to wish Mr. TRUTER’s stocks had run out. There are few sights more humiliating than to see poor human nature held fast by the leg in the stocks. The helpless creature cannot hide his shame, nor can he carry his punishment with even the show of dignity. One thing I can say for the Pniel stocks. They were under canvas at first, and are now under thatch. At Klip Drift while there were any stocks – they were sold, I believe, the other day to pay the debts of one of the revolutionary governments at that Camp – but while there were any, they stood in the eye of the sun on the open square, and many a time have I saw a poor fellow lying in the blaze with a rag over his head – a rogue perhaps, but still a man. Then the government of the day was too poor to have the holes bevelled, and the sharp edges cut the skin. The stocks were, however, undoubtedly deterrent. They had a moral influence. I, myself, never saw them but I felt encouraged to keep my hands from picking and stealing, so that my feet might never get into that grip. But let the moral stocks go. At present I have to do with the stocks commercial.
I have heard the total value of the business stocks on the Fields estimated at a quarter of a million. This I cannot but consider to be an exaggeration. In all probability, however, a calculation of the amount of the capital involved in trade at the various camps, reckoning in stock, buildings, transport and services, would not fall very far short of that sum. There is one house alone at Klip Drift which is said to have stock to the value of £15,000 in its stores. The stores of the firm had cost at least £2,000. I can refer to another house which has under its roof goods to an almost equally heavy amount, and here again the stores have been costly. The Royal Masonic Hotel at Pniel cost £500 in transport from Durban, Natal, of building material alone, and scarcely less than £3,000 must have been spent before the place was opened. How much Messrs. SOLOMON, SMITH & OUTING’s stock and fittings cost I cannot tell. Mr. LASKER brought up with him from Capetown a large, choice and valuable selection of watches, jewellery and instruments. All the fifty or sixty stores, of the first and second class of importance, must, if they wish to do business, keep on hand a varied assortment of goods, and most of them do so. Every shop has its clothing, provision, liquor and ironmongery department. Some stores keep furniture on hand. It is possible to supply yourself with a piano, a four poster, a chest of drawers and a Boston Beauty on the diggings. The supplies of wood are often heavy. There is enough of champagne, claret, sparkling Burgundy, F.C. cognac, Cango, old Tom, and Natal rum to float a man of war in more than half-seas. Half a dozen soda-water manufactories have tidy little sums invested in machinery and bottles. Will anyone guess how much capital is in the Diamond News office? The diggers eat pretty much meat, and the butchers have to keep both flocks and herds. The camps take into store large quantities of Transvaal breadstuffs, while the quantity of tobacco vanted is enormous. What does the capital of the great diamond buyers – UNGER and others – and the Standard Bank, amount to?
Properly considered, all the property on the Diggings may be viewed as so much business stock, as the whole of it is engaged directly in the business of diamond digging. The value of the machinery, implements, carriage, cattle and capital engaged in this department of business must be very great. It would add, we should say, a hundred thousand, at least, to the quarter of a million supposed to be engaged in commerce. It is perhaps forcing language to say that the Pniel Missionaries drive a flourishing business in licenses.
Undoubtedly, up to the present, they have found the Pniel kopje – a bit of land not much bigger than the ground that High-street stands upon, taking in the houses – to be a capital stock in trade. The business is, however, falling off fast.
From the Grahamstown Journal – April 1871
From Kimberley Calls and Recalls on Facebook By Steve Lunderstedt
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